Читать книгу Born in Syn - Beth Kander - Страница 21

If looks could kill, the expression on Nirupa’s face would’ve dropped Catherine O’Brien Hess straight to the ground. But Catherine’s life was not the one at stake here, and she answered the younger woman’s expression with just as deadly a look.

“Don’t you dare say a word to Michael.”

“I will. You know I will,” Catherine said, swallowing the sharp profanity she wanted to insert between the words I and will. She was working on cursing less. Now that she was about to be a grandmother, she’d be watching her mouth even more. And she would be a grandmother. She would not let this cold, rude woman end the life of that baby.

“Fine,” Nirupa spat. “I’ll talk to Michael. But it won’t change anything.”

“Sure about that, are ye?”

Nirupa did not reply further to Catherine. She got into her odd little bug-car, slammed the door, and peeled out of the lot, leaving Catherine standing on the pavement.

Catherine swelled with righteous pride. She’d made it in time, stood up for what was right in the eyes of God. Staved off the relentless flames of hell for at least a few minutes. Long enough to make a difference.

Catherine knew her son would make that woman see reason. See mercy. He was rebellious, sure, but his soul was pure. He had morals. He was raised in the church. He would propose to that woman, they’d have a quick and quiet little shotgun wedding, and when Catherine held her grandchild, all would be right in the world.

Catherine didn’t believe in prophecy or visions in modern times. Old Testament seers were long extinct. (Not that Catherine O’Brien Hess believed in extinction, strictly speaking.) America in the nineteen-seventies was no place for visions and prophecy, unless you were a drug user.

But she believed unwaveringly in the will of God. And she had a sense about this situation. She’d noticed it when Michael brought Nirupa over for Sunday lunch last week; the woman was green beneath her smooth brown skin. She excused herself to use the restroom more often than usual.

Catherine had been given some clues, certainly. But still, that couldn’t quite explain why she had sat bolt upright at six this morning. Why she slipped the car keys from the bowl in her hallway, drove her old Chrysler to Michael and Nirupa’s apartment (Lord Jesus, the way those two lived in sin). Why she parked a half-block away, between two larger sedans, so that her car would not be spotted. Why she felt compelled to wait for Nirupa to come down the stairs, witnessed her vomit into the bushes and wipe her mouth before driving off in that stubby little Volkswagen.

Catherine knew it in her heart and soul and gut: her grandchild was inside that woman, and her job was to see that the baby was carried to term, christened, and raised right. Raised by her, if necessary. Catherine O’Brien Hess had very little family left. She’d fight to the death to protect and preserve what little she had.

She offered a quick prayer of thanks to Jesus, for allowing her to reach Nirupa in time. She prayed that God would guide her son, that he’d convince Nirupa to marry him, to make their child legitimate, to be a real family.

The world needed this baby.

She just knew it.